Long night for Central Christian cagers

In a matter of 24 hours, Central Christian College’s men went from being excited about contending for the MCAC basketball title to a deep hole that could be difficult to climb out of.

The Tigers came out ice cold here Saturday against No. 14-ranked Bellevue and wound up being buried, 82-52. CCC has started conference play 0-2, more importantly both of the losses coming at home.

That has taken the bloom off the 14-2 nonconference rose and Tiger coach Tony Romero wasn’t happy about his team’s first clunker of the year.

“We didn't give ourselves a chance tonight,” said Romero, whose team had lost a hard-fought game to Waldorf College the night before. “We were extremely flat from the jump, Bellevue obviously sniffed that out and capitalized. Our edge all season has been how hard we play and when we don't have that, we become average."

CCC made just 21 of 50 floor shots and an inexplicable 8 of 17 at the line. Aaron Miller led the Tigers with 13 points.

Bellevue, which had six players score in double figures though none tallied more than 17, led 40-20 at the half and the margin continued to grow after the break.

• COLLEGE OF ST. MARY WOMEN 104, CENTRAL 54 — It was even worse for the CCC women, who were steamrolled by the nation’s No. 12 team, which doubled the Lady Tigers 54-27 in the first half.

CCC was just 18 of 73 from the field, 1 of 19 from 3-point. Quamisha Spence led CCC, now 0-2 in the MCAC and 8-11 overall, with 14 points.

CSM placed a whopping seven players in double figures.

“Not a good night for us at either end of the court,” CCC coach Chris Honeck said. “Offensively, our poor shooting continued and after the first 10 minutes or so our defense was virtually nonexistent. We were thoroughly dominated on the boards and just never got anything going. The only two bright spots were our offensive rebounding and our free throw shooting — not enough to beat a team as good as CSM.”